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It doesn't seem that long ago that no matter which daily newspaper you picked up, the real estate news was good and getting better the by the second. This morning the Seattle Times has a story about even highly motivated home-sellers not finding buyers. Key sentence: "The Seattle-area housing market, once touted as bulletproof against the forces that were pulling down other markets across the country, is now stressing out sellers, who are seeing inventories rise, sales fall and prices drop." We love that "once touted." Wonder who was doing all that touting? Damn those touts!
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In Woodinville there's a hole-in-the-wall charcuterie named Bill The Butcher which has the most outl
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A better example of the Times specifically touting the market as bulletproof is probably the article I highlighted in this post back in September 2006.
Choice quote:
Nationally speaking, anyway.
If history is any indication, King County may escape it, according to a Seattle Times analysis of single-family-home prices.
Nice! I was pressed for time, so I used the first instance I came to. But that post does capture the Times brazenly in flagrante toutelicto.
Also, something's wrong with your comment box's handling of blockquotes. It shows up correctly in the preview, but then gets borked after clicking "Post."
All of the below is contained in a single blockquote in my comment code:
This is still part of the blockquote.
Thanks, I've alerted the IT gnomes.
Since when is quoting experts and and siting analysis touting? We're in uncharted waters here, and they (the experts) got it wrong. But why waste a post just to be a hater?
If "The Tim" had finished the quote from the article, you'd see that the Times' analysis wasn't just frivolous speculation (as I think he was implying):
"But not once since 1985 — through recession years, interest-rate spikes, wars and employment downturns — has the countywide median price of a single-family home fallen, although it's come close.
"A federal study, which goes back further, reveals nine months of Seattle-area price declines in the early 1980s that were followed by quick recoveries."
@elasticsyntax: all the experts cited in that article got it wrong, yes. The article asks "Can it happen here?" and then there is this wonderful unanimity that it won't. Since it has, this should raise some questions about the reliability of those sources. If you're suggesting that no one with any credentials in Seattle saw a housing price bubble, and predicted it would pop, then I can only assume that you were--unfortunately--reading the local dailies exclusively.
I agree with MVB that in general, the Times and PI seemed to tow the Windemere line that "It's always a great time to buy!"
It was embarrassing a year ago, now it's obvious Seattle isn't immune to the trend.
@MVB: I'm not saying that no one saw it coming.
But Seattle's bubble outlasted most other U.S. cities, and looking at historic trends (which is all we've got to go on), our burst won't hurt as bad as other cities.
The relative economic stability of Seattle is one of the things that makes it a great place to live. Unless the financial apocalypse is here, which is why I don't own a house.